Shuttle XPC SZ170R8 V2: Small but Powerful

Compact, efficient and incredibly powerful if you spring for the right parts, the Shuttle XPS SZ170R8 V2 has a lot going for it. The small form factor of the motherboard does not take away from its power. Even better is its capability as a portable machine.

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Student Council Presidents are usually those student leaders who are well-organized and have natural leadership skills. There are a lot of anime characters who have the traits to become an excellent Student Council President, so Charapedia asked which characters would make the best one. 10,000 people (46.2% male, 53.7% female) all voted for a total of...

Amazon's Kindle Fire HD 7 and 8.9 tablets are starting today available for pre-orders in 170 new countries across the globe. The duo's estimated shipping date is June 13.

After making unexpectedly big waves with the first-gen Fire tablet, which essentially started a new trend in the tech world, Amazon brought to light two new slates in the fall of 2012, both sporting HD screens.

The 7 and 8.9-inch Fire HDs were welcomed with a decent degree of enthusiasm in the United States, but in order for Amazon to really challenge Apple’s iPads, a wider release of the tablet duo seemed like a must.

And at long last the Fire HD and Fire HD 8.9 are becoming global devices. Or at least close to global, as Amazon has earlier today announced the two are up for pre-orders in over 170 new countries around the world.

Sadly, we don’t have a full list of these 170 countries yet, but seeing as the Fires have come early only to the US, Japan, UK, Germany, France, Italy and Spain, you can probably connect the dots with ease. Obviously, Amazon’s local branches are to primarily handle pre-orders and sales, but you’ll likely be able to get the Fire HDs from third-party retailers too in certain regions.

June 13 is the expected shipping date in most of the new 170 countries, but again, we don’t have specifics yet, so don’t hold your breath for pre-orders to be fulfilled by that date all around the world.

As a quick refresher, the 7-inch flavor of the second-gen Fire comes with a 1,280 x 800 pixels resolution screen, dual-core 1.2 GHz CPU, 1 GB of RAM, 16 or 32 GB of on-board storage, Wi-Fi and a battery rated at 11 hours.

Meanwhile, the Fire HD 8.9 sports a far more impressive 1,920 x 1,200 pix res panel and packs a 1.5 GHz dual-core processor, plus the same 1 GB of RAM and 16 or 32 GB of storage. There’s also a version with 4G LTE, though obviously that’s not going to make its way to 170 new countries.

In other related news, it appears Amazon’s Appstore for Android is itself hugely expanding, being now open in “nearly 200 countries worldwide”. Way to up your game, Amazon!